I sincerely doubt that Trump is going to pull us in the right direction. Even he is a bit of an elitist, and that would be generous.

As to the history of the income tax, scholars will tell you that the 16th Amendment never conferred any new power of taxation upon Congress, it was merely a clarification. It was also a joke played upon the D's by the R's and it went too far.

As to the debt, it's worth noting a few other things. China loves our debt. They keep buying it to keep the dollar good and strong, and that blows up the trade balance in their favor. China simply has no compelling interest to see us stop spending money "we don't have". But even fewer people will notice that the federal government is a sovereign. It can never go bankrupt.

Feast your eyes on this interesting treatise on money:

http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2017/12/defining-tax-reform-battleground.html

The money has to come from somewhere before it can be taxed. Where does it come from? We print it, the government spends it, and it goes into circulation (I'm not talking about the fractional reserve part).

For Trump to do any good to the economy, he'd have to plug the hole known as the trade deficit, some $500B a year, demand that is going elsewhere. And his business cronies won't have it because that would create demand here, tighten the job market and raise wages.

And I'm not so sure that Congress is retarded as they are Pavlov's Dogs, trained to vote for money.